Re: Boxing

Impressive showing from Eubank Jr against Yildrim. Still think Groves and Smith will beat him though.

A good win for Anthony Crolla as well in a tough fight with Ricky Burns. If Terry Flanagan doesn't get the Linares fight, and I'm not convinced he will, I wouldn't mind seeing him fight Flanagan.

Bellew vs Haye being on a Sunday is a bit weird. Same prediction as last time; if Haye doesn't blast him out early, Bellew stands a real chance.

Not sure Haye is capable of doing the distance at a fast pace any more. Regardless of the Achilles injury, this is a fella who was told to retire for good by doctors in 2013. Rumour has it that his split with Mcguigan only came about because he'd advised him to retire too.

Re: Boxing

What a load of sh*t that fight was, glad I went out and watched it and didn’t pay to watch it on box office. Wasn’t impressed by AJ at all in that fight, especially with the show boating at one stage by dropping his hands and basically telling Takam to have a go. That was the kind of fight I’d expect from Haye, not AJ. Poor performance in a fight he could and should have finished much sooner than he did. That said, it shouldn’t have even ended when it did, Takam although was clear he wasn’t going to win any rounds, he was in more than a good enough condition to take the fight to a points decision.

Re: Boxing

No one can argue that AJ is at least one of, if not the best heavyweight in the world right now. But only because everyone else isn't really *that* good either.

Put any of them in the same mix as Lewis, Tyson, Bowe etc in the 90s and I honestly think they'd struggle to win a single legitimate world title between them. And that's not even the greatest heavyweight era of all time either.

All this hype is doing my head in. Sky Sports running a poll the other day asking if Joshua was the greatest British heavyweight of all time.. laughable.

Re: Boxing

No one can argue that AJ is at least one of, if not the best heavyweight in the world right now. But only because everyone else isn't really *that* good either.

Put any of them in the same mix as Lewis, Tyson, Bowe etc in the 90s and I honestly think they'd struggle to win a single legitimate world title between them. And that's not even the greatest heavyweight era of all time either.

All this hype is doing my head in. Sky Sports running a poll the other day asking if Joshua was the greatest British heavyweight of all time.. laughable.

Between AJ & Lewis to be fair.

I think he's a very good fighter. What people are forgetting is that he had trained to face a bigger opponent, hence the extra weight he put on etc, Takam to his credit did a very good job at short notice, I also get the feeling as AJ pointed out at the end of the fight that everyone is expecting to flatten and ko everyone he faces.

Re: Boxing

I think he’d be exposed by better opposition; as he very nearly was by a 41 year old Wlad... who may well have stopped him if he hadn’t taken bad advice from his corner.

The Fury who fought Klitschko and the Joshua who fought Klitschko.. who you backing?

Are you serious? Klitschko despite being 41 could still take apart pretty much the whole of the heavyweight division bar the odd couple and he is far too experienced to lose a fight based on what his corner were saying, especially when he has sparred with AJ, he knows what his weaknesses are.

The Fury who fought Klitschko or the AJ that did is a bit of an odd thing to say because it was like 2 different Klitschko's in each fight. Against Fury he was throwing barely anything, I remember thinking it as almost being a complete farce, he just didn't seem to care. Against AJ he was going for it though, if he had gone at Fury the way he did AJ then Fury wouldn't have got the win, absolutely no chance at all.

I wasn't impressed by AJ against Takam but if he hits anyone like he was hitting Klitschko, as well as being able to take hits like he was in that fight then I can't see anyone putting a stop to him any time soon, especially Fury.

The only one who can come close to AJ right now is Wilder and possibly Parker if he fights like he did against Takam but he wont, that was a one off because it was a late change, it wasn't going to be easy. Fury and AJ aren't even in the same league IMO.

Re: Boxing

Are you serious? Klitschko despite being 41 could still take apart pretty much the whole of the heavyweight division bar the odd couple and he is far too experienced to lose a fight based on what his corner were saying, especially when he has sparred with AJ, he knows what his weaknesses are.

The Fury who fought Klitschko or the AJ that did is a bit of an odd thing to say because it was like 2 different Klitschko's in each fight. Against Fury he was throwing barely anything, I remember thinking it as almost being a complete farce, he just didn't seem to care. Against AJ he was going for it though, if he had gone at Fury the way he did AJ then Fury wouldn't have got the win, absolutely no chance at all.

I wasn't impressed by AJ against Takam but if he hits anyone like he was hitting Klitschko, as well as being able to take hits like he was in that fight then I can't see anyone putting a stop to him any time soon, especially Fury.

The only one who can come close to AJ right now is Wilder and possibly Parker if he fights like he did against Takam but he wont, that was a one off because it was a late change, it wasn't going to be easy. Fury and AJ aren't even in the same league IMO.

That’s sort of the point I was making earlier isn’t it. Wlad very nearly beat him. Wlad would pretty much beat everyone else at the minute. Wlad, especially at 41, is not an ATG. People are hyping AJ up as if he is one.

If he fought in some of the bygone eras where the division was full of greats, AJ would struggle to win a legitimate world title; as would Klitschko and the rest of them.

We’ll never know for definite if Wlad listened to his corner and took his foot off the gas. I reckon he did though and Vitali has publicly said he blames himself for his brothers loss because of the bad advice he gave him inbetween rounds.

As for Klitschko’s performances against Fury and Joshua, I don’t think he just “didn’t care” against TF.

Fury was horrible and awkward, made himself difficult to hit and stopped Klitschko from getting any sort of rhythm going. He wasn’t pretty, he definitely wasn’t exciting but he executed a perfect game plan and beat ‘the man’ in his own back yard.

Maybe that loss put a bit of fire in his belly against Joshua.. there’s no doubt that was the more exciting fight but Fury’s performance was easily better technically than AJ’s was.

We’ll hopefully see next year if AJ really is in a different league to Fury. I, for one, definitely don’t think he is.

Re: Boxing

The late, great Manny Steward talking about this current crop of heavyweights. Can’t remember many others making predictions as accurate as these back in early 2012.

The bit about Price especially is eye opening. Don’t think anybody else had doubts over Pricey’s mental toughness back then. Just goes to show how much a world class trainer can see in a fighter from sparring.

Nothing about AJ though who was obviously just an amateur training for the upcoming olympics at the time.

Re: Boxing

Just saw a press conference of it and Parker thinks he's quicker than AJ, don't see it personally. Parker has had a much easier group of opponents than AJ has. Could be a boss fight but if AJ is on it, I think he will get the KO again.